The Arts and Letters College Seminar is a unique one-semester interdisciplinary course in which students and faculty explore a significant question on such topics as faith, reason, and identity, while developing students’ speaking skills.

A requirement for all sophomores majoring in the College of Arts and Letters, CSEM offers students an introduction to the diversity of the Liberal Arts at the University of Notre Dame through the exploration of profound issues that transcend disciplinary boundaries. CSEM emphasizes the development of analytic skills, intellectual flexibility, and verbal communication.

Small classes—no more than sixteen students in a section—enable faculty and students to engage in meaningful opportunities to read, think and reason together about an important topic. Examples of topics studied include the relationship of faith and reason, the causes of poverty, the consequences of environmental change, and many others.